Anonymous hacked Yandex taxi causing a massive traffic jam in Moscow

The popular collective Anonymous and the IT Army of Ukraine hacked the Yandex Taxi app causing a massive traffic jam in Moscow.

This week Anonymous announced to have hacked the Yandex Taxi app, the largest taxi service in Russia, and used it to cause a massive traffic jam in Moscow. The threat actors ordered all available taxis to a particular address.

The traffic jam took place in the center of the Russian city on September 1st, 2022, dozens of taxis were sent by the hacktivists to the address on Kutuzovsky Prospekt, one of the main avenues in Moscow.

Anonymous told to Hackread.com that the hack was carried out in cooperation with the IT Army of Ukraine.

Due to the attack, one of the main streets of Moscow was completely blocked for more than two hours.

“On the morning of September 1, Yandex Taxi encountered an attempt by attackers to disrupt the service — several dozen drivers received bulk orders to the Fili region,” the press service noted. 

“Due to fake orders, drivers spent about 40 minutes in a traffic jam.” reported Forbes Russia.

The Yandex-owned company stated that its security department immediately blocked the intruder and halted the fake taxi requests, however, the hack has caused a traffic jam. The company also announced that it will address the issue of compensation for the incident in the near future.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, Yandex taxi)